Walden International to Focus on Indian Hardware and Technology Startups

Published By : 17 Aug 2015 |Published By : QYRESEARCH

India seems to evolve as a top destination for venture capital firms. Walden International, a venture capital firm located in Silicon Valley, aims to increase its investments in India. The firm is waiting for clearances to start a local fund in the country and invest in technology and hardware start-ups in the country. According to Lip Bu Tan, the chairman of Walden International, the firm is presently investing from its overseas fund in India and is planning to develop a local fund to back the start-ups in India. The company is waiting for some clearances from the India government.

Walden International manages investments worth US$2.6 billion through various funds and has been chosen by Ganapathy Subramaniam, the veteran in semiconductor industry, to partner as a venture capitalist with the Indian start-up companies. Tan and Subramaniam’s ties can be traced to the deal through which Subramaniam’s firm Cosmic Circuits was acquired by Cadence Design Systems, a U.S.-based electronic design automation company. Tan is the CEO of Cadence Design Systems. As a member of HP Enterprise board, Tan met a number of start-ups in Bengaluru last week, and is quite optimistic about the Indian start-ups making a mark in the hardware and semiconductor sector. The hardware and semiconductor sector in India already looks positive with Foxconn and Flextronics building their manufacturing facilities in India.

Walden International had announced in 2013 that it would set up a fund worth US$100 million for Indian start-ups. However, it waited to see the potential in the Indian market and invested from its overseas fund. It has been one of the oldest venture capital firms to recognize the potential in the Indian market and invested in companies such as Mindtree. Tan has backed companies such as Ambarella and GoPro. He has pointed out that with the advancement in technologies such as computer vision, cloud computing, and Internet of things, the hardware and semiconductor industry in India would rapidly develop with the help of good quality start-ups from renowned institutes such as IITs and BIT.